


Can you hold me close, (can you love me most)

by Austennerdita2533



Series: The Fight Is All We Know [4]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: (Will be canon divergent at some point), F/M, Fluff and Mush, Set 8x04, Teeny bit of angst, post TBTWP
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-30
Updated: 2019-05-30
Packaged: 2020-03-29 13:50:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19021225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Austennerdita2533/pseuds/Austennerdita2533
Summary: Days later, and it still seemed strange and untrue for Brienne to be wrapped up in him like this. Not to mention for Jaime to be equally wrapped up in her, too.





	Can you hold me close, (can you love me most)

**Author's Note:**

> Apparently I needed something soft and sensual that explored JB's feelings during the missing month?? So this is what transpired... 
> 
> I hope you like it. :)

War, when followed by celebration and wine, often made for the unlikeliest, most unexpected of bedfellows. It was known. Defeating the dead certainly brokered no exceptions on that front. 

Days later, however, and it still seemed strange and untrue for Brienne to be wrapped up in someone like this. To be held close, regarded by a man as if she were a desired thing, as if she were something precious to behold and embrace. The muscular press of his body, which slid then settled against every sensitive, vulnerable crook she possessed, warmed her more than a new dawn and these northern furs ever could.

Though she’d tried, she couldn’t defend against it. The warmth, the husky fondness in his voice. How her gooseflesh pimpled. She couldn’t resist him, not like this. She softened into a state of cautious and baited contentment because of it, their hands threading together with unpracticed familiarity, with trailing possessiveness he took no pains to stifle or suppress in front of other people. 

“Let them gawk,” he’d said. “I don’t care. We have nothing to hide from them.”

Everything he did or said breathed awake a little fire inside of her now. Awakened some new sensation.

Jaime’s touch, the tangled tenderness in his gaze whenever their eyes met and held; the slight upward curl of his mouth as their tunics and smallclothes hit the floor in a forgotten, discarded heap after the door clicked shut behind them and he moved to lavish kiss after kiss against her neck, beneath her ear, along her collarbone, and down the ladder of her ribs like he’d been desperate for this forever; like he was dying for another taste of her, for one more moment alone together to savor—all of it had left her breathless. Her head spinning. In fact, the pads of his fingertips were so soft and languid, they were so tantalizing each time he thumbed her skin, tracing up her spine, that it almost seemed to be unconscious on his part. Some affectionate, caressing instinct. 

How in seven hells was this happening, Brienne wondered? Why had this man chosen to be nestled, and spooning, against a ladyknight as large and as boorish and as graceless as she?

There was too much to process here. Too many emotions to try, and fail, to comprehend. 

Jaime made it seem like having her in his arms was not only something he wanted, but needed, and needed so fervently that the distance between them continued to shrink and shrink until they were entangled entirely. Joined from lip to limb, and from sword to soul.

The surreality of that was electric. Toe-curling. Unbelievable in every sense of the word. 

Brienne’s bones hummed with sensations she’d probably never find the words to describe, so she said nothing. Instead, she arched closer against him and smiled before blushing a splotchy red, always blushing.

There was this…this maddening magnetism between them she’d never been able to breach before, an ache that’d tugged at her for years and years. A longing begging to be filled.

_Gods_.

It was impossible to deny it now. Not anymore. Not after the battle had taken nearly everything worth saving with fire and ice and blood and had left them torn up, wearied; both of them haunted by losses, by all they’d seen yet adrenalized more to still be here, living. 

What was she supposed to make of that? What was she to do? 

Somehow Brienne knew she’d never regret the chance to scratch her hands through his beard or feel his pulse quicken under her palms if he drew her nearer, so she let go, stopped thinking through everything because it was bloody exhausting. She brushed aside the nervous flutter that’d started to sprout roots in her belly. Drowning in the present, in his enveloping nearness, she ignored the strangled whisper in the back of her head telling her Jaime might leave Winterfell soon. That he’d never choose her over the beguiling, corrosive twin he’d defended for most of his life and had always loved so fiercely. Quashing the notion he might leave her behind again, too—for Cersei.

Something sparked in Brienne’s breast like flint at the thought: part warning, part terror; part grasping, passionate feeling. 

She wanted Jaime to stay with her. Hoped for it, rather. That much was true, her heart betraying her better reason. However, she dared not think too much on it knowing he’d already fulfilled his oath to the living and was free to do or go as he pleased, with hope itself a precarious, tottering thing. 

It mattered not if this intimate bliss was nothing more than some fleeting interlude for him, after all, or some flight of survival fancy that thawed with the snows then carried him somewhere she couldn’t follow. It didn’t matter because he was here now and this was real. Why not let herself have it? Have _him_ in a way she’d never dreamed she could?

This time together, the chance at happiness—it was theirs. This unfurling closeness between them was no one else’s to have, to hold, or to share. Only theirs. 

_Only theirs_.

Heedless of her toppling walls and fragile restraint, therefore, both of which Jaime undoubtedly would crumble to dust with one more heady look when he next cupped her chin to press hot lips against her throat, tumbling them backwards into an alcove after he caught her wrist in a vacant hallway on their way back from a council meeting, or lowering her to the featherbed once the sun dipped and the whole castle slept after another arduous day of rebuilding, Brienne let herself fall. Float. Feel. She threw down the gauntlet of fear she carried like sword and armor long enough to care for him in a way she’d never allowed herself to do previously…to really, truly, love him with all the openness she dared. Taking in all Jaime had to give her and more.

He wasn’t an easy man to want, of course. The impulse to deck him often rivaled the one to kiss him. Both were equally dominant predicaments, and he knew that as well as she did. 

Between these walls, though, with her hands softly cradling his face and his breathy laugh tickling her cheek in the afterglow, and as the last embers in the hearth crackled, fading into a peaceful stillness, Brienne could almost believe he was hers for a little while. Couldn’t she? To try and trust that what they had was meant to last? She could be happy to think so, to almost convince herself that a small part of him would be hers to keep. Why not?

When the snow flecked his golden hair and Jaime grunted “ _it’s too fucking cold here, wench; too fucking cold,_ ” smirking cavalierly as he slunk an arm around her waist as they ambled along the battlements, he could be hers. Jaime could be hers in this castle, beneath these furs in the North where it was stuffy but he stayed close. She could grant herself that much. Collect moments. A few treasured moments.

Mayhaps, while she lay with her head nestled against his chest and his palm resting flat against her bare hip, taking in the muffled sound of his heartbeat, conscious of how she’d probably always be the one who loved him most whether or not he’d come to know it himself, he could be hers then. He could be hers _._

**Author's Note:**

> Thoughts? Comments are always encouraged and appreciated. 
> 
> (P.S.I fully intend to write another part or two but I have some personal stuff to take care of that may keep me out of writing commission for a bit. *wrings hands and yells* I just wanted to get this portion out there before I chickened out and hoarded it for months, like I'm want to do haha. I promise I'll get around to writing the rest, though, so thank you in advance for your patience.)
> 
> Thanks for reading! xx


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